Latest KFF Health News Stories
“At least one million children are at risk of dying of malnutrition in the central-western part of Africa’s Sahel region due to a drought crisis, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said [Wednesday], adding that more resources are urgently needed to help those in need,” the U.N. News Centre reports. “There are currently 15 million people facing food insecurity in the Sahel, which stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea,” the news service writes, adding, “The nutrition crisis is affecting people throughout Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and the northern regions of Cameroon, Nigeria and Senegal.”
E.U. Pledges 40M Euros To Address Food Security In Kenya
“During his visit to Kenya, E.U. Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs announced new support to address food security in Kenya, which is often affected by recurrent drought,” an E.U. press release states. “Up to 40 million euros [approximately $52.5 million] will be dedicated to nutrition, water supply, and livelihood support,” and “mothers and children will be in particular focus of this initiative, as they are the first victims of drought and hunger,” the press release notes, adding, “The funding comes as a part of the new 250 million euro E.U. initiative, called ‘Supporting Horn of Africa Resilience (SHARE),’ to support the people in the Horn of Africa to recover from the recent drought and to strengthen the population and regional economy to better withstand future crises” (5/2).
WFP, UNHCR Concerned About Food, Water Insecurity In Border Areas Between Sudan, South Sudan
The U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) “has warned clashes along the border between Sudan and South Sudan threaten to plunge the region into widespread hunger” and “said it is scaling up its humanitarian operation in South Sudan to assist a growing number of refugees and displaced people,” VOA News reports. WFP “plans to assist 2.7 million people in South Sudan this year under an emergency operation covering the border region and other areas,” the news service writes. WFP spokesperson Elizabeth Byrs “said [the agency] is providing special supplementary, nutritional feeding to about one-half-million young children, pregnant women, and nursing mothers who are suffering from, or are vulnerable to, malnutrition,” according to VOA (Schlein, 5/2). UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency, said in a press release it also is concerned about the rising number of malnourished refugees arriving in South Sudan and the threat of water shortages in several border areas, the South Sudan News Agency notes (5/2).
Blog Posts Respond To Report On Premature Births
The March of Dimes Foundation, the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child Health, Save the Children, and the WHO on Wednesday released a new report, titled “Born Too Soon: The Global Action Report on Preterm Birth,” showing that 15 million infants are born prematurely each year, 1.1 million of those infants die, but 75 percent of those deaths are preventable. The following blog posts addressed the report and its findings.
HIV/AIDS Funding Does Not Undermine Efforts To Fight Other Diseases, Study Suggests
“While the battle against HIV/AIDS attracts more donor funding globally than all other diseases combined, it has not diverted attention from fighting unrelated afflictions — such as malaria, measles and malnutrition — and may be improving health services overall in targeted countries, according to a study on Rwanda published” Wednesday in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, an American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH) press release reports. “A six-year investigation of health clinics in Rwanda by researchers at Brandeis University infuses fresh evidence into a long-standing debate about whether the intensive focus on HIV/AIDS, which in 2010 alone killed 1.8 million people, is undermining other health services, particularly in African countries that are at the epicenter of the pandemic,” the press release states (5/2).
U.N.-Sponsored Report Finds 1 In 10 Infants Born Prematurely Worldwide
Fifteen million infants, or nearly one in 10 worldwide, “are born premature every year, and 1.1 million of those infants die, according to a U.N.-sponsored report released Wednesday,” Agence France-Presse reports. “Premature birth is the leading cause of death for newborn infants and is on the rise globally, said the report led by the March of Dimes, the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child Health, Save the Children and the World Health Organization,” the news service writes (5/2). “For the report, preterm was defined as 37 weeks of completed gestation or less, the standard World Health Organization definition,” USA Today notes (Healy, 5/3). According to the report, “[p]reterm births account for 11.1 percent of the world’s live births, 60 percent of them in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa,” and, “[i]n the poorest countries, on average, 12 percent of babies are born too soon, compared to nine percent in higher-income countries,” the U.N. News Centre writes (5/2).
MSF Official Discusses WHO Working Group Final Report On R&D
The Results for Development Institute’s Center for Global Health R&D Policy Assessment blog features an interview with Judit Rius Sanjuan, U.S. manager of the Access Campaign of Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), who discusses the final report of the WHO Consultative Expert Working Group on Research and Development: Financing and Coordination (CEWG). Sanjuan addresses “the origins, significance, and likely impact of the CEWG’s work,” according to the blog (Ghoshal, 5/2).
Nature Publishes First Of Two Controversial Studies On H5N1 Avian Flu
“In a long-awaited study that helped prompt a contentious debate over the wisdom of conducting research that has the potential to help as well as harm, scientists reported Wednesday that they had engineered a mutant strain of [H5N1] bird flu that can spread easily between ferrets — a laboratory animal that responds to flu viruses much as people do,” the Los Angeles Times (Brown, 5/3). Published in the journal Nature, the study is “the first of two controversial papers about laboratory-enhanced versions of the deadly bird flu virus that initially sparked fears among U.S. biosecurity experts that it could be used as a recipe for a bioterrorism weapon,” Reuters writes (Steenhuysen, 5/2). The U.S. National Security Advisory Board on Biosecurity “had asked journals to hold off publishing” the studies, but “[t]he panel later dropped its objections after it became clear the engineered viruses were less virulent than had been feared,” according to the Washington Post (Brown, 5/2).
Chagas Disease Especially Harmful For Expectant Mothers; New, Better Treatments Needed
“Chagas disease — a parasitic infection transmitted through an insect commonly known as the ‘kissing bug’ — is one of the most common infections among pregnant women in the Western Hemisphere,” Peter Hotez, president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute and director of the Sabin Vaccine Institute and Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development, writes in the Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood” blog. “It can be found all over Latin America, from Mexico and Central America to Paraguay and Argentina,” he writes, adding, “For expectant mothers, what makes Chagas disease especially harmful is that it can be passed to their unborn children, causing highly lethal congenital infections.”
Reuters Examines Challenges Related To Estimating Number Of Undernourished People Worldwide
“Calculating the number of hungry people around the world at any given moment, let alone predicting how that number is likely to change in the future, is no easy task,” Reuters reports in an article examining the numerous challenges of estimating the number of undernourished people worldwide and noting the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is expected to release new data and methodology in October “as part of [its] annual report on food insecurity.” According to the news service, “The question is not whether metrics are necessary, but how to collect, interpret and share the data to present a realistic and accurate picture of the food security situation.” While “[i]mproving the way hunger is calculated could have far-reaching consequences for the way governments and aid agencies respond more effectively to hunger crises, experts say,” “[u]ltimately … it is not data, but action, that makes a difference,” according to Reuters (Rowling, 5/2).
UNFPA Director Urges India To Address Family Planning Needs
India “has to actively and aggressively address the issue of family planning” in order to improve human development indicators, including health, education and living standards, UNFPA Executive Director Babatunde Osotimehin said Wednesday, Reuters reports. “India, Asia’s third-largest economy, is set to overtake China as the world’s most populous nation by 2030,” but, “despite its impressive economic growth over the last two decades, it has failed to substantially reduce hunger as well as child and maternal mortality rates,” the news service writes, noting that “[a]bout 60 percent of Indian women have no access to family planning services.”
107 Charged In Medicare Fraud Busts, Scams Totaled $452M
Federal authorities rounded up doctors, nurses and even social workers in what they called “a national takedown” of medical professionals who allegedly bilked Medicare out of nearly half a billion dollars.
High Court Ruling Could Have ‘Unintended Consequences’ For Medicare Payments
The Associated Press reports that a high court decision to strike down the health law could be disruptive to Medicare’s payment systems.
Reuters Profiles GAVI Alliance CEO Seth Berkley
Reuters profiles GAVI Alliance CEO Seth Berkley, recounting his childhood and early career, providing a brief history of GAVI since its inception in 2000, and discussing Berkley’s goals and vision for the alliance. “Berkley’s specialism is vaccinology and he is in Africa again, working to introduce routine childhood immunizations which protect most people in the rich world,” the news service writes, adding, “His interim goal with GAVI is to save another four million lives by 2015, and his big mission is for the global health community to get vaccines against every preventable disease to every child who needs protecting” (Kelland, 5/2).
Women’s Health, Health Law Issues Heating Up Campaigns
News outlets examine how women’s health issues and the health law are affecting the presidential race as well as specific campaigns for Senate, congressional and state races.
State Roundup: Pittsburgh Insurer, Hospital Extend Contract Despite Ongoing Fight
News outlets report on a variety of health policy issues in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York, Oregon and Pennsylvania.
State Governments Wrestle With Medicaid Expenses, Lawsuits
Officials reckon with health care costs in the context of budget dilemmas in Illinois, Kentucky, Connecticut, Alabama and Wisconsin.
In Global Study, U.S. Ranks Very Low In Preventing Premature Births
A World Health Organization/United Nations/March of Dimes report ranks countries on their premature birth rates.
TRICARE Fees, CBO Numbers Draw Scrutiny
Politico reports that the House Armed Services Committee is preparing to take on defense spending issues — including TRICARE fee increases. The Fiscal Times reports that questions about Congressional Budget Office analyses are coming from both sides of the political spectrum.
Study Confirms U.S. Health Spending Far Outpaces Other Industrialized Nations
According to The Commonwealth Fund, the U.S. spends more than 12 other industrialized countries, but the care here is not necessarily better.
